First Stop: The North Pole
The holiday season offers so many choices for places to go and things to do with our grandkids. My favorites — and two that are definitely memory makers — include the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad (CVSR) Polar Express train ride and the Country Lights Festival at Lake Farmpark. Both of these will transport you back to your childhood and you will enjoy the magic and wonder in your grandchild’s eyes.
Elves & Bells
The Polar Express boards at either the Akron Northside Station or the Rockslide Station in Independence. It’s approximately a two-hour train ride. between November 8 and December 21. Let the kids wear their Christmas
jammies and enjoy the railroad journey to the North Pole. Santa’s elves wander about the decorated train cars, singing and serving hot chocolate and cookies. Santa himself will make an appearance on the trip back home.
To make this evening even more special, try to watch the movie “Polar Express,” or read the book a week or so before you leave. We enjoy taking the grandkids out for a quick dinner before heading to the station.
The Country Lights Festival offers wagon rides around the property to see all the beautiful lights and to transport people to other areas of the farm for participation in the many different activities. Our children’s favorite experience is to go to Santa’s workshop where they can make a toy with one of Santa’s elves. Yes! They can choose from over 30 different wooden toys and an elf will help them make it by hammering, screwing and gluing, step by step. When finished, they can then use paint and glitter to complete their masterpiece. Leave the toy to dry on one of the many toy shelves while you enjoy the other activities and pick it up before you go home.
Because both of these events are rather popular, and tickets are sold online, it is best to secure tickets as soon as possible. With young grandkids, I like to get the earliest time periods available. This way, you can make your special toy and see everything before the crowds arrive and you can depart before it gets late and kids become too tired.
Hot Tickets
I have had friends tell me that they have had to wait for years before they were lucky enough to obtain tickets to these events. However, if you are a member of Lake Farmpark or CVSR, they open up ticket sales before offering them to the public. Lake Farmpark gives advantage to those that live in Lake County but will also give their members the same early time frame.
One more venue I would like to discuss is the GLOW exhibit at Cleveland Botanical Gardens; another excellent adventure for both grandparents and their grandkids.
This beautifully decorated garden houses many holiday trees, miniature trains and rooms of gingerbread houses. I was surprised by how much time the kids took to look at all the details of those houses, all made with candies and icing. You can also walk through the warm Costa Rica rainforest area; it feels so good on a cold winter day.
There is also an outdoor train ride in the evenings that takes you around the Hershey’s children’s garden, all lit up with Christmas lights. We have gone in the early evening and had a break to eat dinner in their café. You can purchase something to eat or bring your own food. We did both! The children loved their gingerbread man cookies for dessert.
Karen Shadrach is an on-the-go, in-the-know NEO grandmother of two sets of twins. The boys, Jefferson and Tyler are 4, the girls, Abigail and Brianna, are 2. Do you have grandparenting questions about where to go and what to do when you get there? Email Karen at [email protected].
